


If We Go Down In Flames, The Smoke Is Going To Spell Our Names

by bunnystealsyourcarrots



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: A girl and her serpent, AU, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Medieval, Dark-ish, Eventual Smut, F/M, Fantasy, Light Angst, Medieval, Monster Banging, Reylo - Freeform, Slavic mythology, Smut, Zmaj - Freeform, reylo au, zmaj are like dragons but shape shifters also know for getting frisky
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-31
Updated: 2019-04-20
Packaged: 2019-08-11 15:07:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16477862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bunnystealsyourcarrots/pseuds/bunnystealsyourcarrots
Summary: A tale of a Medieval princess who gains a new husband with a tail.





	1. Chapter 1

"Zmaj is a mythical winged creature of extraordinary strength...his mouth and wings spitting fire. He has the ability to shape-shift into an eagle, snake, other animals or into a human, but he is believed to be half-human, in fact, powerful and seductive."  

                                                                                                       - Jelena Curcic

 

                                                                                            ____________________________

 

It is not like I set out to lie with a monster.

 

That is no usual outcome for a princess.

 

No, for elite women of good breeding like us, we are captured by the foul monster and then saved by the handsome prince you have never met before. The prize, our hand in marriage with a stranger. The creature’s sentence, the mercy of banishment. No better prison for him then the corner of Hell that he crawled out of, his place far away from humanity, but that does not explain why my hand tightens along a twelve-inch dick on my wedding night.

 

A quickening up and down along skin the color of the night’s sky with a scattering of cum pearls standing in for the stars- a steady stream of galaxies sliding into my grip.

 

The milkiest way to get my monster to purr my name, and when his talons curl, he does.

 

“Rey.

 

                                                                                      ___________________________

 

It took me ages to bleed. My friends and cousins at court scenting the air with their supposed true worth long before I. My dear mother constantly voicing her fears that I would never reach womanhood if I continued selfishly maintaining slim hips without my moon time shame, but a week to the day after I finally stained my sheets from gold into crimson, the first of the princes arrived to lay claim to me and my dowry.

 

A steady parade of suitors showing up for a maiden of sixteen.

 

A line of hopefully intended to be begging to make my acquaintance, and I could usually tolerate the arrogant and aged for about twenty minutes before making an excuse of feeling faint. A fluttering of my lashes sealing the deal, a quivering hand over the heart sending their bearded chins bobbing with sympathy, and away I would leave them with their consent. The role of the helplessly infirmed played with one shaky footstep in front of the other until I had reached outside the castle walls, my stride straightening into a run. The tinkling bells and braided ribbons in my hair fluttering behind me after I took off without anything holding me back and only the farthest depths of the forest was as far as I would go.

 

A sip of air only seeming possible to indulge in once I stopped hearing any signs of mankind, could no longer see castles and the greedy men filling them up. Yes, there on the outskirts of civilization, I would drink in the wild. The deepest inhale of nature blooming a rare breed of happiness in my lungs.

 

“I do not want to marry any of them,” I gasped over and over, the initial stifled whimpers breaking out into freer sobs against my palm. The cries louder and uglier when no one but the trees were supposed to hear my wishes, but he heard me.

 

Oh yes, something listened.

                                                                                     _____________________________________

 

It’s not uncommon to pair together sounds with memories. For example, my youth is tied to the slap of my bare feet on the herb-covered floor in the Great Hall. The dried lavender and thyme that were meant to deter vermin suddenly disrupted under my play, scattering in the air- and coming up behind me, the exasperated huffs of my nurse. A stream of giggles running free out of me so long as I remained uncaught, but once I was, more slaps.

 

At the time of my life when childhood gaiety rubbed off to make way for crushing duty’s new resting place upon my shoulders, I remember most the repetitive sound of a needle piercing through woven cloth. The hours spent with my maids of honor shackled to the feminine pursuits indoors, our intricate embroidery coming together beautifully while my restless gaze took frequent wandering glances towards the windows. The outside so hopelessly far away as I stitched flowers and leaves, all the things that could not be touched but could mock me with a prick of my finger.

 

As for the true beginning of my adult life, if I were a different sort of sentimental, I would likely recall the gravelly timbre in a certain prince's voice during our first meeting, but whenever I revisit that night’s events in my mind, I hear the harmonizing from a lyre and a reed pipe. The melodic tune going on and on in a loop. A stream of rather merry notes only slightly changing once the first course ended during our little feast for nothing of particular, and this was the tune for all things familiar in my life. Any rare, improvisational flourishes never encouraged with clapping from the listeners, but the music always accompanying the endless currying of my father’s favor from foreign guests. Those Counts of Here, and Earls of There, and Dukes of Wherever going on and on and on with incessant flattery that barely skipped a beat even when half a succulent guinea fowl with pomegranates was snatched up from our plates for replacement by the most savory peppered peacock. The spread at a king's table reliably plentiful- and predictable- for those who delighted in engorging on indulgent chatter among slurps of mead, and as I looked on silently that night my fingers tugged meat off in the most delicate fashion.

 

The savage in me showing when pinkish juice slipped down my finger.

 

"Your Highness," the Duke of Albany cut in, his satin-covered gut spilling onto the table when he leaned closer to gain my father's ear. "I believe you may find some interest in my recent acquiring of an additional ten hulks of two hundred tons each."

 

"Two hundred tons each?" The end of my father's nose twitched in interest. "Those sound like sturdy ships."

 

"I daresay that they art the finest made." The duke shifted his gaze towards me, stressing, "A near fleet that could ferry countless luxurious materials up the river under the right owner, and you know how amenable I am to trading precious objects."

 

"What say you, Princess Rey?" My father chimed in, punctuating his question with a hearty bite of a roll. "Do you care to be bargained with barges?"

 

“Not before the third course at least,” I answered, softening my refusal with a teasing smile towards the Duke of Albany.

 

From across the table, my mother did not share my humor. No, the tines of her fork scratched against her plate. My continual lack of betrothal no laughing matter for her when my family stood to benefit impressively from my loss, but she held her tongue as mead sloshed around it.

 

All the things not said scheduled for a later departure when less judgmental eyes rested upon her.

 

In all fairness to my frequently vexed mother, I had not held up my end of the deal as the sole royal child. As she was want to remind me on most days, the only step I could choose- to make amends for my terrible mistake of pushing out of her loins as a member of the weaker sex- was to marry well. And I had not.

 

No, on more than one occasion, I weathered her calling me a disappointment where others could hear it, let the shame of my sins sink into my soul as I deserved. However, before I could dip into another pool of guilt that she had set out for me to drown in- or we as a group could last a whole five minutes without bringing up selling me off- a gangly Burgundian count took the break as an invitation to plead his case.

 

“Your Highness,” he cleared his throat, rubbing pastry flakes off of a limp mustache, “I for one do hope that you enjoyed all those rounds of cheese that my caravan did deliver a fortnight back. Of course, I know cheeses art not a ship, or ten, but they art a representation of qualities most treasured where I am from."

 

My father couldn't resist asking. "And those art?"

 

Over the rim of his goblet, the count eyed me. "Why the qualities of beautiful, creamy coloring and the patience to see our commitments through.”

 

"Ah," I sighed, looking down when spearing a potato. "So I am worth waiting for, like a cheese? Or else I am pretty and empty-headed, like what you prize most where you art from?"

 

"I think you misunderstand, Princess-

 

"Do I?" I raised my gaze, head tilting in elegant challenge. "And here I hath gathered from your suggestions that I am the product to be traded and gobbled down...is that not correct?"

 

It took the mounting irritation in my voice for the Queen to set aside her drink, her hosting skills aiming all the soothing velvet in her tone towards the reddening count. "'Twas only a poorly executed joke from my _young_ daughter! My,"she cooed, extending the word for as long as possible as her eyes widened while considering how she’d finish the sentence, "but is she brimming full of surprises and amusements tonight."

  
  
"Oui," he replied, the color draining back to normal in his cheeks. "And how blessed is the company around the spirited."

 

On most evenings, I could reasonably count my blessings for my place inside a life of ease and privilege. No one needing to inform me that I had not earned the lustrous pearls in my ears, nor the sparkling scarlet pendant on my chest. No, from even an early age, I had understood that if I dared point towards any peasant in town the owner of my attention would have surely traded places with me- enthusiastically- but on nights like these, I envied the commoners. After all, they could work. The less pleasant of peasants even able to make choices for how they lived, what they ate, what kind of fruit they sold in their stalls while all I could do night after night was demurely pat a cloth against the side of my lip as my family casually discussed breeding me out like I were a heifer.

 

To be sure, I would likely never experience a paralyzing fear of losing a roof over my head, nor the pangs of ravenous hunger scraping my belly. But my insides churned for the fulfillment of something more in life, a growing list of bone-deep wants and needs whispering even into my gayest dreams that I should forcefully demand nothing less than something less ordinary. For me, my preferred destiny unfurling did not include forcing out another smile to ameliorate the bruised ego of a lower tier royal who coveted my fortune to make up for his family’s financial failings. No, that particularly subservient role felt almost sickening that night when blood from successful kings and queens flowed through my very being. But unfortunately, if it were up to my family, I would fake cheerful while choking down more spoonfuls of hard to swallow conversation from at least five other eligible men at the table, and in spite of all my intentions to endure that smothering meal until at least the soup course, I could not. 

 

“Your Highness,” I shifted a pout towards my father, my pointer finger rubbing against my temple, playing up with each swipe what they dreaded most- a loss of me to illness before I had garnered my use. “I believe that something in the sauce hath weakened my spirits. As such, might I take leave to rest early tonight- to shine brighter for our family in the morning when the new guests arrive?”

 

“You must,” my father insisted, immediately standing up from his seat to allow me the same. “Though we shall greatly miss our dear one, I grant leave to you and good blessings.”

 

A few minutes later, I rested my palm and cheek against a corridor wall. A sense of relief coursing through my veins after my escape, my breathing gradually slowing to relaxed again as my fingers splayed on top of a tapestry depicting a unicorn and a maiden. The prettiest blonde so peacefully at home among the beast, so calm in the wilderness with a castle looming behind her. A scene I passed by every day, but only on that night did I morbidly wonder if it might be a mercy if the creature ran the maiden through with his horn before she was forced back home.

 

As though hypnotized by the option, I looked close enough at the weaving to nearly bump my nose against the gold fibers. Transfixed by it, so lost in my thoughts that I did not pick up on the steps behind me until the hanging oil lamp above me snuffed out from a sudden gust of wind in the corridor.

 

"Princess Rey?" A low voice tripped shivers up my spine, and when I turned around while gasping in surprise, the taper in the stranger's hand illuminated his stranger features; those high cheekbones, that prominent nose, all that raven-black hair curling above broad shoulders. The sum of his parts adding up to a man most unusually handsome with unnerving brown eyes that almost gleamed into fire-lit honey as his plush lips curved in amusement. "Oprosti mi, I did not intend to startle my host."

 

"I find that hard to believe," I countered irritably, posture straightening into erect to make up for my flash of weakness. "And who art you?"

 

At least eight years separated us, but he placed an arm across his torso, bowing low as if I were his equal. The proper respect immediately gifted to me, but I couldn't help noticing how easily he took to the dark when he lowered himself; the true spirit of his expression hidden when he swept his attention over my form.

 

"Kylo Ren, Prince of Raška," his husky accent echoed in the corridor, his massive body reclaiming its full intimidating height again after I rushed to curtsy, "and I only meant to help light your way if needed."

 

"Please forgive me for speaking so curtly, Prince Kylo Ren." I stammered, the annoyed edge entirely sanded out of my tone as dismay took up residence in my features. "T-The court did not expect any guests until morning."

 

"I could not wait to share a castle with you."

 

In the space of ten words, he had navigated us from polite to past decent. The new path between us uncharted while this stranger obviously possessed the nerve to push forward, but to my extreme surprise, I did not feel lost. Instead, my cheeks prickled with heat. The first time I ever noticed my body reacting to such brazen flattery, the most surreal fluttery sensations tingling in my cheeks before drifting lower and lower as the prince stepped closer, my mouth curiously drier while drinking my fill of him. All of my senses almost too keenly aware of how quite alone we were- how unwise it was to hold such an engaging stare as opposed to backing away like the rules of engagement suggested, but I could not break our connection.

 

No, it took two tries of opening and shutting my mouth before I breathlessly replied, "What a disappointment I must be then to treat you so rudely.”

 

"On the contrary,” he corrected, his intense stare coaxing my cheeks into a darker pink over freckles. ”I am only disappointed that your attributes were so rudely undersold."

 

"You art too kind."

 

"Not often," he remarked, but before I could process his words enough to wilt away in fear he'd gestured to the tapestry. "I wonder, who did you admire most in the scene?"

 

"The artist."

 

"Da, that is probably true," he glossed right over my skirting around the question, his scrutiny remaining upon the tapestry for a few seconds longer before seeing right through me, "but if I wedged into your head, I suspect that I would find the princess not as taken by the maiden."

 

My heartbeat stuttered.

 

My insides feeling raw and laid bare in front of someone who gave off an air of devouring whatever he pleased, and I shook my head to ward off any further intrusions into my mind.

 

"W-why assume that?”

 

“For the same reason you art not feasting with your family,” he replied, nonchalantly trailing a finger up towards the top of the tapestry, “you do not desire to live in this castle. Why wouldst you crave to be the beauty in that one?”

 

Not for the first time during our conversation, I wound up jostled into momentarily speechless. Unbalanced again, on the wrong foot, but this time I bowed my head with a low murmur of goodnight. The sooner I was out of his sight long enough to catch my breath, the better, but another question gave me pause,

 

"What do you long for, Princess Rey?"

 

A nervous laugh bubbled out of me. “To sleep.”

 

“If you were the unicorn,” the prince pressed, speaking of myths but studying me with intimidating seriousness. “I wager that you wouldst prefer the room to run.”

 

“I do confess that I should not so easily turn down that option.”

 

"Then I shall give this to you when we marry.”

 

An unfamiliar parting of “dobro veče” left his lips, and it was the bold prince who spun on his boot heels to depart first from our meeting. The world around me dimming when he left with his black cape swishing against the ground, but it was his parting promise that would not soon stop echoing in my ears; this prince's claims keeping my mind occupied in dizzying circles for ages after my cheek met my pillow. Everything he had said, and every mannerism, repeating again and again because before that night, I had feasted with a fair share of arrogant men, powerful men. Yes, I had even been offered pretty songs from fickle men who routinely razed villages after the lightest slight, but nobody ever spoke with such matter of fact assurance for our twining fates, his beliefs firm. And although I had listened to plenty of men making elaborate plans for our wedding, I worried that this one might actually succeed.

 

No other option for someone like him but to mold the world to his pleasing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story was supposed to be a monster fucking one-shot...and I just couldn't stop. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy the mini-fic, and I'd love to know what you thought!
> 
> -Bunny


	2. Chapter 2

In the morning, my servants had barely cracked open my doors before mother hurried into the room. A stream of sighs sneaking out of her lips between louder huffs, her wooden heels click-clacking about the room until she stood in front of the gowns laid out for me. No good mornings yet offered but her finger pressing against her chin just long enough to introduce shaking her head with an emphatic no. A second round of disapproving noises erupting from her to accompany a hand swishing tizzy, and the roosters had not even crowed to greet the brand new day before a queen accomplished annoying me out of my slumber to take part in her panic.

 

"‘Tis all wrong, dreadful," she groaned, furiously shaking her finger in the air when a servant held up my new blue dress. "How couldst you even suggest such a thing?"

 

"Please lady mother, calm yourself," I begged, sitting up in bed while my words stretched through a yawn. "’Tis no need for you to harm your heart so."

 

"Oh, how little you understand," she sniffed, departing into the adjoining Bower between our rooms in order to scrounge up clothing capable of easing her high spirits. A plain, grey wool gown clutched in her grip when she returned, the kirtle an even drabber taupe linen. "Wear your hair in three buns with a simple mesh snood covering them. No pearls woven in. No added enticements, and we shall pray that your net does not ensnare the big catch of the day."

 

"Why?" I cried out in exasperation. "For over a year and a half, you hath begged me to hint to father who I should prefer to marry."

 

"Aye, and I fear we waited too long, let word of your generous endowments and talents spread to darkened parts of the land best not disturbed." At last, the Queen came closer, her finger grazing along my cheek in the most motherly gesture before she whispered close enough that no servant could hear, "Nae, my dear, Prince Kylo Ren ‘tis not a man for you."

 

"Do you believe him cruel?"

 

"Nae, I know it to be so."

 

                                                                                          __________________________

 

If one tortured me, I still could not put my finger on why I allowed wickedness to sway me after my morning warnings. In the boldest terms, my mother most passionately made her case for why I should make myself meek, looked over. As she was want to tell me often, she knew best, but all those well-intentioned instructions to present myself as less desirable to the Prince of Raška felt unnatural upon my approach to the Great Hall.

 

Instead, I felt the wildest urge to grab attention, to keep it.

 

For truly, I could not say that the exchange that the prince and I shared the night before wasn't a bit unsettling, but he remained on my mind through my dreams and into the day. This peculiar man in black who dared to lure me off of the predictable path of remaining a passive puppet on her parental strings, hinting to me of other unexpected adventures ahead if I were only brave enough to make the first move with someone who I could not fathom ever describing as boring. Is it any surprise that my fingers trembled against my bosom in anticipation. The thrilling sound of my name on the prince's tongue replaying in my mind, and the scattering of gooseflesh trickling down my skin sealed the deal for me.  

 

The fear of the unknown no longer the scariest outcome I could imagine.

 

My mind suddenly fixed on making at least one choice for my future, and that's how my satin slippers led me away from safety and towards a hidden route to the kitchen. The less clear rewards worth the risk of entering a narrow passageway that was intended for a royal escape to the gardens should the need arise, and I did not consider my course nearly as dramatic when I hastened towards my goal. After all, I only stopped to pluck two currants out of a bowl. The berries rolling around my palm until I pressed them between my fingers, stained my lips pink into ruby with the juice.

 

A desire for more of the unusual far more enticing than the familiar, and that is how I came to wear the color of the devil on the way to my damnation.

 

                                                                                     __________________________________

 

Only ten men followed behind the prince in their matching tunics of velvet onyx, the shiny silver cloak clasps on their shoulders depicting a serpent in flight. The fanfare kept to a minimum with such a meager party, and judging by my father’s disapproving hum, the group from Serbia had set off on the wrong foot in front of a famously mercurial audience. The suggestion of a proposal almost already off the table even before an attendant called out the royal’s full list of names, but our king kept his tone warm.

 

“We art honored to welcome Kylo Ren, Prince of Raška. How fares your father these days?”

 

After a flourishing tuck of his fist under his sternum, the prince bowed.

 

“Alive,” he replied, pausing for a beat before smiling, “thankfully.

 

On the heels of that seemingly innocuous news, a cloud of whispers buzzed around the room. The comment holding a particular meaning for others that landed beyond my comprehension, and while I looked around in bewilderment, my father shifted in his throne, his eyes hawkish. "If you art here for the reason I believe you hath graced us with your presence, I must admit shock that your King of Raška hath not led your party. These advantageous arrangements art generally decided among fathers, equals- or do you not trust his counsel?"

 

"On the contrary," the prince answered, his regal smile unflappable in the face of an immediate interrogation. "As King Han hath a way with convincing words, I wouldst welcome nothing more than his voice here today to help smoothly procure the addition of our court's newest jewel. However, Queen Leia hath taken unwell, and my father refuses to travel away from her bedside these two long months past."

 

In an almost fluid motion, Kylo lowered his gaze for a second of displayed grief and no sooner did his dark lashes fall before a red-haired member of his party extended a scroll to his leader, and he, in turn, offered it to my father's attendant."As you shall read in his writings though, my father offers his deepest regrets as well as two chests full of substantial apologies for the unavoidable lapse in tradition."

 

The King straightened up in his throne, waving away the parchment for later perusal. “I accept the apology.”

 

Once my father's shoulders relaxed, I grew tense. The toe of my slipper stealthily rubbing against the back of my ankle where nobody could see, the unconscious back and forth against silk likely mimicking my mother's for a different reason. For something about the goodwill offered and accepted so quickly between the two men suggested an easy rest of the conversation, and when the King shot a curious glance towards me to check in on my opinion, I wasn't grimacing from distaste as I had before with previous suitors.

 

No, I stared at this foreign prince with my lips parted in awe, my good opinion of him obvious to anyone else glancing my way. For after knowing so many dull days in my life, how could I dampen the interested sparkle dancing in my eyes after Prince Kylo Ren came to woo me with so few men and words. The odds for success stacked against him but all the advantage necessary if my notoriously stubborn father no longer spoke of offense. Yes, as I’d correctly suspected, this man gained what he wanted with few losses, and he played his hand quick and in the open. No tricks or flowery words needed.

 

I wanted to learn to do the same.

 

I wanted to learn from him.

 

I wanted him.

 

To the surprise of no one in the court who'd witnessed my endless courtings, the longer that I continued not encouraging my father to send the prince packing, the more his eyebrows drew together to form a perplexed line. But after a heavy exhalation, he let the hairs rest for a lie down as he took the reins again in the negotiations. “Ah though," he cleared his throat, "'twould be remiss not to inquire about the nasty business with your neighbors, the Bulgarians.”

 

“They art a problem no longer,” the prince replied without emotion, his face rigid. “There art no enemies of Raška.”

 

The King’s bushy eyebrows raised. “How fortunate.”

 

“We take care of what is ours- and that includes problems.”

 

From almost the beginning of the meeting, the two men had spoken of my possible betrothal in the most roundabout way, but the prince never offered so much as a shred of attention to me until they finished that last volley of information. Indeed, they could have very well been deciding estate matters, the joining of our hands an entirely dispassionate affair for all involved, but when Kylo Ren's amber stare met my green, the possessive flicker in his irises said otherwise. I was why he had come. I would be leaving with him.

 

“Your Highness,” he smoothly continued, his stare tearing away from me in order to rest all radiating confidence again upon my father. "If it also appeals to you, I would marry your daughter in two days time. As is customary of my culture, we shan't burden your castle and family with excessive feasts; we shall depart within the week."

 

A gasp dropped my mother's mouth open, but Prince Kylo remained focused on my father. No pause given to a woman's worries if a king hadn't called for his head, and two of Prince Kylo Ren's fingers briefly raised to touch the serpent insignia on his cloak clasp. "The bonds firmer between _our_ two houses, _our_ futures tied. And though I shan't provide you with property- or any other wealth- in exchange for my immense matrimonial gain, I do extend the same gift to your house that hath kept mine safe. If ever there comes time for a battle, I shall provide my body, my _wrath_ whenever necessary."

 

If not for my seating among a foreign delegation, I would have let out the most shocking laugh. The amusement bubbling up and over as I reddened into gasping fits because how possibly could the gift of one person’s offered sword compete with the far more generous treasures that my father had previously turned down. The gift paltry on the verge of a slap in the face, but my father took me off guard by nodding his head. 

 

“It so pleases me.”

                                                                                          ______________________________

 

On the morning of my marriage ceremony, my father gifted me a gold crown, a glittering brooch for my traveling cloak with matching pins of sapphire and diamonds for my hair. My mother providing a trove of tears to match from the ceremony until the moment that she hugged me goodbye a week later, but when they asked what my new husband should like to see me wear on our voyage, he coldly answered,

 

“I only want her dripping in pearls.”

 

In a seamless exchange, my distraught mother returned my new baubles to their cases, and my husband immediately coiled a length of ivory pearls around one wrist and then the other.

 

The loveliest manacles I had ever seen.

                                                                                        ________________________________

 

A month away from my eighteenth birthday, I had never traveled farther than one town over.

 

I did not know what customs awaited me, what traditions.

 

There are those who say that ignorance is bliss, but I only felt my pulse race. The unknown vast and approaching as I took my first steps away from home as someone too naive to realize how strange a request it was for a husband to demand that only he help his wife onto the new mare gifted to her by her father. The stable groom ignored despite his protests, the riding party watching us with keen interest, but instead of catching any of that contagious dismay, I only registered the cold slide of a leather glove into my hand. The near purr of my name breathed beside my ear as my new protector wrapped an arm around my waist, held me to him before hoisting me into a saddle as if I weighed nothing.

 

The sound of my heart hammering in my head.

 

A smile eventually reaching his lips once the rhythm of our horse's hooves on the ground matched like we had always ridden together.

 

A stranger to me, my partner forever.

 

As a royal woman of the realms, I had entered into our marriage schooled on all things hospitable. My well of pride intended to stay full so long as I took uncomfortable silences and filled them with lively joy. Supposedly, no greater pleasure for a member of my sex than making others welcome in my presence, and in an attempt to make our road together less rocky starting at the beginning, I set a slow pace for my horse. The longer to get to know him.

 

“Dear husband…” I started, shaking my head with a click of my tongue against my teeth. “I mean, my...Prince- pray forgive me, what am I to call you?”

 

“Kylo, when we art alone, shall suffice,” he crisply replied, flicking his head towards my father approaching us with his royal guards in tow. “My liege when _he_ can hear how you art no longer under his rule, how you art mine.”

 

A claim draped over them might have inspired other women into a state of giddy delight, but Kylo made the admission loud enough for others in our group to hear, said mine with such finality. The dropping of the sun into the sky no less certain than his commitment to keeping me under his thumb for the rest of my life, and there beside the most handsome man that I ever laid eyes on, I remembered the warnings from my mother of his cruelty. How quickly my father had passed me along in exchange for this man's bloodthirst after he offered it up on a platter.

 

I was his.

 

I belonged to someone feared, someone I might grow to fear.

 

My father waved us over, so blissfully unaware of the veil of heaviness descending over my heart. That sudden perverse impulse urging me to gallop forward, never let him go, but my too perceptive husband reached out to hold my reins. I in his clutches when our horses stopped across from a ruler who frowned at the subservient portrait of his daughter that greeted him.

 

"Twenty chests shall depart with you," my father's unusually raspy voice listed my dowry, his eyes unable to meet my mine while doing so, "and thirty more shall arrive by sea within the next few months. 'Twas my hope that my dear Princess Rey should receive the freshest hunted furs long before the first winter chill, a wee comfort in darker days."

 

"I would not worry, Your Highness," Kylo wound my horse's rein around his fist. "I do not expect a bed with her in it to ever go cold enough to require furs."

 

A flush broke out across my father's cheeks to mirror the one blooming on my chest. Both of our hazel eyes wide and horrified. No responses to shock more similar as I was his child, his summer girl, but no longer.

 

"Wouldst thou not agree?" my husband vaulted the question over to me, his smile with a snarl in it as he waited for the correct response after I'd so recently promised to honor and obey. "My lady?"

 

"Aye, _my liege_."

 

In fits of immature anger towards my father, I had more than once hurled the sharpest and bitterest words I could think of, but strangely enough, it only took the softest brittle admission to cut a king's heart in half.

 

To make up for the betrayal of handing me over to someone capable of fearlessly smirking at my family's shared pain, my father did not show off his ruffled feathers. No, he kept his chin defiantly up. No trembling lips on his end when he offered the last advice from him that I would ever take as he pointed towards the east. "Be careful going through Northern Resistia, Rey. Old enemies of our land sing a song about taking you captive, ransoming a beloved princess for land that they forget no longer belongs to them."

                                                                                        _________________________________

 

A little less than one town away, my husband stopped the party, disembarked from his horse to tie my mare to another. No better place for me, in his opinion, than sharing his saddle. His massive thighs enclosing mine, his muscular chest pressed against my back. On and on those mocking laughs from him gusting my hair into disarray each time that I squirmed over the embarrassing tableau that we surely presented whenever we passed other riders, and he would give them a flourishing hand wave.

 

"Why must we women be continually at the mercy of menfolk- you violent, impulsive creatures?" I eventually snapped, the girl of good breeding and manners left several mortifying moments behind me by the time I sent a scowl over my shoulder.

 

At the word creature, my husband laughed harder.

 

"Oh _draga_ , you are not treated so miserably."

 

As my husband showed no signs of ever taking my frustration seriously, my teeth ground, my nose bunching up at the end. “Oh, that my hand could summon a hawk now to peck at you and show off my violence," I hissed, eyes narrowed into sharp slits meant to cut him down, "but you art so uncivilized that there is not even one tiny bird in this whole pitiful riding party.”

 

All at once, the laughter stopped entirely, and when I looked back, Kylo’s expression had darkened to match his tone.

 

“We do not believe in enslaving anything with wings.”

 

If Kylo hoped to display a humanitarian streak with his statement, he found only a scoff waiting for him. After all that he had already put me through, I could not picture him as a friend to any animal. As far as I could tell, the ability to show kindness to humans seemed beyond my husband's grasp, and I would have sooner gone cheerfully clogging nude in the road then drum up any belief in hidden goodness lurking inside of him when I could glance down and see my wrists swimming in pearls. The finest dressed prisoner in his lap during the day- and then nothing but discarded meat in the nights.

 

Yes, even there he sought to wound my ego. The space empty beside me in a straw bed that he made for me, no forcing of his company where I desired it. No, none of those heated stares of his yet acted upon with hands and mouth and motions, and as the sounds of our party making merriment would go around and around a bonfire every night, I would chase after dreams with a scowl pressed into my pillow. The girl as fussy as a frisky fox since the bedtime illusions that curled my toes started to involve my brute of a husband taking liberties with me.

 

A kiss upon my shoulder.

 

A few dozen trailing lower, their urgency growing more and more insistent until that feverish, punishing heat woke me up into gasping for oxygen, for him.

 

A body under his control even when I slept, and I might have hated him for it.

 

No, I am sure I did.

 

Oh did he irk me those early days, for as much as I loathed our improper riding situation, I had also discovered that a press of Kylo's arousal against my rear could evoke unexpected reactions in me- strange wants. A confusing bit of wonderful occurring on some of the rougher roads when he would suddenly fail to catch a shaky breath between a bite of his teeth. A shudder from his chest passing into my back, a warmer sensation tightening low in my belly after hearing him, feeling him rock his hips away- and in moments like these, I could barely stand the infinitesimal distance between us.

 

_Why doth you not want more?_

 

_How is this enough for you and not me?_

 

Oh, how I starved for what I had never tasted before, the urge to lie with him only intensifying each day as I had witnessed enough animal matings to know that I inspired him in a carnal way too. The next stop for us so obvious if my husband possessed only the courage to ask for it, and I would occasionally get close to screaming my encouragements that he take what he needed until our loud passion scattered birds in the sky. Oh yes, I would have done anything to take the edge off until his fingers no longer dug in so harshly on my hips on bumpier roads, his exhalations less sharp from his nostrils. His desires no longer plaguing us both if he would not see them through, but that did not explain the titillations and teasings for me on the calmer paths- the way torture sometimes danced on my skin after a whiff of his woodsy, slightly smoky scent. That intoxicating smell that I longed to gather on my tongue with each delicious inhale, craved to wear on me, and I could have spit with anger when he continued to provide us no avenue for satisfaction as he refused to join as man and wife.

 

If it were not so unladylike to do so, I would have confronted him sooner; I would have put an end to the shared madness. But mother had only ever informed me that someday I should consummate my marriage, and as any day could be someday, I could not yet press the issue unless I cared to look desperate. So, I kept my pride, and to my immense displeasure, my only companion every night remained whatever random eagle scratched talons on the branches above my bedding. The predator above lingering around for campsite food scraps, even the animals wise enough to keep their distance from the girl salting her pillow with aggravated tears; this desperate one softly cursing her luck for ending up abandoned by everything and everyone, a maiden far from her castle but not at home among the beasts. A princess out of place.

 

A girl so used to honey cakes and sweeter feasts who had ripened to the age of eighteen one night with no party nor praise for her at all, but who did wake up the following morning to discover her reluctant beloved not within the campsite. No sign of Kylo around, nor even faint traces of his boot steps wandering away. No recalled mention of a hunt on the night before when I thought about it, and when an hour later I panicked enough to ask his armed guards about where he had journeyed off to, a red-headed knave continued calmly packing up our belongings.

 

“My lady,” the man named Hux handed me a wine bladder for my nerves, an added reassuring wink while helping me onto my husband’s steed,” you need not worry about the prince's safety. I promise that your prayers are far better reserved for others.”

 

At first, I used to brush it off as a trick of the mind, but I had gradually come to accept that the men did often cast funny glances and little smirks my way during the voyage. Nothing licentious, praise God, but something about their looks bordering on curious into smug. A shared joke between them at my expense, no doubt a reminder of the one time when I had politely asked about the location of where my husband slept and the guard roared with laughter while pointing up. The foreign princess clearly mocked so that she would never ask questions again, her humbling a sport. The lesson learned by me to avoid talking to them as much as possible, and that was why I was not entirely surprised that this Hux dismissed my worries, but to my later shame and horror, we left the campsite without Kylo.

 

As we rode, I kept glancing over my shoulder. My stomach not settled in the least by the wine as my insides violently churned over my foolish choice to not put up more of a fight, just simply trusting my husband’s men to guide me to safety. Letting them all ride off with me when I knew better than to believe that my alpha male would ever accept another man helping me onto our horse, and my thighs gripped the stallion harder.

 

_Oh God, he left his horse._

 

_What royal wouldst leave his favorite steed, his wife?_

 

_He must be hurt. He must be dead._

 

_Who shall protect me? Who shall want me now?_

 

For miles and miles, I swung my head from side to side, looking around for hope or explanations to explain the day’s strange events. My widest eyes finding nothing but my own worst expectations in front of me, and the dread amplified when the chirps of birds oddly died out the deeper we delved into a forest. Everything bizarre and off in a whole world suddenly conveniently still enough for me to hear each nervous heartbeat banging in my eardrums, and then once we reached a sign for Northern Resistia, I saw why the animals kept themselves quiet.

 

The whole of the town was charred or on fire.

 

The people a black stain on the ground.

 

A bone or two left for picking over by vultures, but not until after the black winged beast in the sky stopped beating wings that were the size of ships spitting out flames from the tips. A length of someone's mangled entrails stretched between his claws; the gore tossed up for another rip by his teeth. Those gleaming white terrors in his mouth dropping my mouth open in return to scream back at this nightmare playing with his food, but none of my horror before equaling the sickening feeling that struck me once the creature’s eyes met mine.

 

A familiar amber.

 

  
"I told you not to worry," Hux laughed from beside me, his eyes glossy with an almost religious fervor. "The rulers of Raška always protect what is theirs."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So...any thoughts?
> 
> 'Cause I know that I sure hate when my husband turns out to be the kind of guy who chews on another chap's entrails, hah
> 
> -Bunny


	3. Chapter 3

Black to blue.

 

Black to green below.

 

Black to red, red, violent red.

 

A leaf fell from bough to bough on the wings of a breeze as my lashes fluttered open; a rather lazy descent for the russet-colored flesh parted by darker veins, the look of the near skin on the foliage somehow familiar. The memory of what it matched right there on the fringes of my conscious, and once the leaf went into a freefall towards the ground, I remembered.

 

My husband.

 

His wings.

 

Shocked into motion, I bolted up to sitting. A cough into a gasp into a panic. A succession of sobs ripping out of me before a sharper cry let loose after I noticed Kylo sitting beside me. My human-like again husband silently observing my most terrifying emotions escorting me on a walk through Hell, and my nails dug into the forest floor to help with scrambling away from him.

 

"Shh," Kylo placed a finger on my lips, the faintest smile on his, "be calm, Princess. You hath only fainted."

 

"But you ar-" I gasped, my lips violently trembling against his touch, "a...a...you art a-"

 

"A zmaj," he finished for me, his tone casual enough to calm a panicking child, "as is my mother Queen Leia, and my grandfather King Vader before were. As your father knew me to be when he traded your innocence for the fire in my veins."

 

"Nae,” I immediately defended, but tears welled up in my eyes as I processed his suggestions. “Nae, my father wouldst not-"

 

"He did, Princess."

 

At my very limit with overwhelmed by the insidious insinuations taking root inside of me, I closed my eyes again, head shaking. My tears saturating Kylo’s skin after sliding down my face to meet his fingers, my living nightmare continuing though I whimpered. A wounded sound following another and another. A grieving for me having to accept bondage to a monster, a murderer who seemed ready to pillage my familial bonds next and I could not catch a breath.

 

“Nae, I-I do not believe you.”

 

"Tis the truth regardless."

 

A sob hiccuped in the back of my throat, my discomfort choking me. An exhale already impossible to come by even before the beast possessed the audacity to softly journey his finger from lips to my throat, the gentlest strokes on my skin as though the source of my despair could ever possibly soothe me. "You must release me," I begged, opening my teary eyes to stare into his. "I beseech you to do the right thing by me as I can not  _be_ with you- ‘tis unnatural."

 

"I shall not release you," Kylo assured me, his voice lacking warmth although a circle of molten lava rimmed his pupils- the creature no longer masking what he was when I already squirmed in his presence, "You art mine."

 

“But we hath not fully joined together as husband and wife,” I sputtered, cringing through the clumsiness of speaking such matters out loud. “Your men can attest to it, and we may still part without disgrace.”

 

“I shall not release you,” he firmly repeated.

 

"But I do not want you.”

 

"You made your lips red for me." My husband’s head tilted a fraction, seemingly transfixed by my mouth and all the words spilling out of it that he did not appear to believe. "You wanted me to take you away,” he continued, cupping my cheek in his palm, dragging his thumb over my lip,“ have always wanted something different, and when you so prettily begged the forests to free you from a marriage to a man, your dreams were answered."

 

"Nae they were not-"

 

"Aye, they were," Kylo growled, patience abandoned along with his touch as he got up to his feet, looked down at me, "for I am not a man, and one day you shall beg me to ravish you in all my many forms."

 

___________________________

 

I did not talk to him for two days.

 

What could be said to a monster?

 

How could I possibly presume to reason with him or anybody in our party when the most ardent pleadings to help me escape fell on deaf ears? My first begging to one of our escorts gently turned down with a pitying head shake. The second and third men I asked informing me of the great honor to nest with a Zmaj, that I should cheer my good fortune.

 

I did not share their opinion.

 

No, suffice to say, I knew only agony dipped aggravation. A crippling sadness as our party rode farther and farther away from sanity, and my captor continued forcing me into sharing a saddle with him. No guarantee that if ever I managed to one day slip free from his smothering possession that my family would not simply return me out of fear of his reaction, and each time the devil’s arm around my waist gently squeezed to comfort my hysterics, I cried harder for Kylo. I let him share my uncomfortable. After all, my years of grateful and obedient had earned me little favors with my parents if they sold me off to this twisted fate, and therefore, I would offer no grin and bear it to my wolf in prince clothing.

 

No, in the days after the veil lifted off my eyes, I made sure that all experienced my misery during this one long stumble into the mist for me.

 

The future cloudy, nothing safe around me.

 

The chills ever present on my skin although my temper kept rising, and the heat between Kylo and I reached its peak on a morning when we approached a ramshackle village. The residents long gone, the heart of the homes with it and my husband added to the eerie mood by waving his loyal countrymen to journey on without us. A two finger flick to push forward, a silent command to put heels to horse flanks without asking why, and after we were truly alone my husband guided our horse into a canter along the former village's now crumbled line of defense.

 

"The first time I laid eyes upon you,” Kylo broke the silence, dipping his chin down so I wouldn’t miss a single husky word, “your complexion and eyes reminded me of the lilies in our palace gardens- creamy ivory to vibrant green, your scent as floral and intoxicating.”

 

At this, Kylo inhaled, let out a hum of contentment. “‘Tis why, for you, I shall pluck those flowers all out of growing, stop nature in its wake so you wake up in bed one day surrounded by petals that could not rival your beauty but will try in vain."

 

"P-Please-" my begging shook, my whole body fighting to stop vividly picturing myself in that bed. My skin bared, my heart racing. “P-Please, let me be.”

 

To my surprise, Prince Kylo Ren effortlessly snapped back into the role of a gentleman behind me. His posture straightening. His compliments no longer warming my ear. The scenic seduction over with a click of his tongue against his teeth, an urging for our horse to catch up to the group as I experienced the strangest compulsion to look back towards whatever border between us had crumbled upon hearing his admissions. Surely, the road no longer plain when wildflowers had to have taken over, the snarling vines curling inside of me still. One by one, those foreign thorns nudging curves into my good senses that I never guessed could exist, forcing new beliefs in, and I desperately longed to ask Kylo about what bloomed inside of me.

 

However, the ride continued in stubborn silence, the trees ahead of us the only witness to my flushing skin.

 

_______________________________

 

On the most picturesque beach, I walked alone.

 

As far as the eye could see, the foamy turquoise coastal waters gently lapped along the shore. A scattering of peachy shells jutting out from the black sand beneath me, such gorgeous, unique shapes breaking free from the darkness before some of my less nimble steps finished shattering the treasures. A crunch of shells underfoot, my head foolishly turned towards a whistling wind behind me. A few seconds of wandering blindly- the tiniest mistake- but it was time enough for shell shards to cut into my foot: my blood-slicked tendons exposed until I was left raw, exposed.

 

All that was once flawless and beautiful becoming painful thanks to my carelessness, and when I woke up still weeping, I did not have to dwell long upon what that disturbing nighttime illusion signified. No, as my hand clutched my heaving chest, I understood down to my bones that I had always appreciated serene but been greedier for something unexpected. My once dashing Prince Kylo, no exception.

 

Yes, as a foolish maiden, I allowed beauty to distract me. I charged towards my future without questioning what I might sacrifice along the way, learned the hard way that I had gone the wrong way. But as a newly enlightened woman, my wide-open eyes narrowed on the massive black eagle perched in the tree above my bedding. 

 

I would never make that mistake again.

 

_______________________

 

It came to pass that on the back of a horse the days blurred together. The impressive landscapes oh so gradually changing from moors to valleys to cliffs. A veritable feast for the eyes of any person who had previously experienced so little of the world, but I found few causes for celebration or excitement on our travels. How could I appreciate anything when I mainly existed in numbness? My gaze bereft of emotions until some broke through on the day we waited in sturdy boats for the tide to turn in order to push us onward to safe passage. The horses stored. The men as restless and eager to leave, and even when we floated out to sea, I still refused to cry in front of the others as I said my silent goodbye to the grey shores of my homeland. All that I had known becoming lost to the horizon; a piece of me left behind. A chunk broke off between dips of oars into the dark blue unknown.

 

To his credit, my liege let me linger alone in the sorrows all afternoon until I stared too long at the waves.

 

"I wouldst go in after you if you jumped," he commented, sidling up to beside me, a smirk added at the end to take the sting out of his threat. "Though I would rather you waited until I was out of my best suede tunic."

 

"What a pity for us all that you value garments over lives," I replied, sounding as hollow as I felt before I shifted a glare his way. "On occasion, I hath wondered how human you might be- if anything at all throbbed in your chest when you massacred Northern Resistia that morning, but I now suspect not."

 

All traces of amusement snuffed out of Prince Kylo’s expression.

 

A pointed pause following, but the boat’s oars dipped again and again into the water for a few moments. The world possessing the gall to go on the same with sea salt sprays stinging my cheeks, my husband's expression digging the bite in further with every second that he remained infuriatingly immovable: a savage island to himself in the middle of a boat. A brute not bothering to correct me, not apologizing for his actions, but after a begrudging shake of his head, Kylo abandoned his unfeeling airs. "They made threats upon your life," he stated, waving a hand afterward as if that adequately explained everything.

 

"Then round up the guilty.”

 

"The guilty lie, and their families for them."

 

"'T-Tis not right, your reaction," I stammered, rejecting Kylo’s logical callousness when the most frustrated tears wouldn't stop salting my cheeks, my chin, the wounds he'd left in my dreams. "I-I do not encourage you killing on my behalf going forward,” I declared, swallowing hard, “and if you do so again, I shall not see any glory in it.”

 

Kylo scoffed.

 

"And how do you fancy your family first garnered their estates? You assume they politely asked for it? Let threats slide, bre?" Kylo’s eyebrow arched in challenge, and when I did not rush to contradict him, he smugly nodded. "Ah,  _see_ , we hath barely left the shore, and the waters art already getting muddied."

 

"How dare you!" I snapped, smacking my palms on the handrail. “What can an abomination like you possibly know about ruling honorably?”

 

"What do you know of ruling at all, my lady?" Kylo calmly countered, all ice in the face of my fire. "For if you understood anything about the subject, you wouldst not look so roiled by me reasonably pointing out that your precious family did not likely earn their wealth through mercy and favors versus backstabbing and battles. No, you wouldst see things how they art if you were sensible for one minute instead of constantly enraged.”

 

“You-”

 

“Unless of course,” he held up a hand, curtly cut me off, “an ingenue’s foolish lie is easier for you to stomach than accepting that every person who hath thus far gifted you a comfortable life hath first made sure they were the last ones standing- no enemies left."

 

"Do not use me as an excuse to justify your bloodthirst,” I hissed, jabbing my finger against his chest. “The people you slaughtered in Northern Resistia were not your enemies or mine, and I did not fear them. I only fear you!"

 

“How close you stand to someone you fear,” Kylo mocked me, his gaze shooting down to my finger. "And how unfortunate that I remain quite fond of you."

 

“You-” My cheeks colored, mouth forming an o of exasperation. “You art a tyrant.”

 

“In time, we shall see,” Kylo dryly replied, and after a bow he left me all alone with my worst expectations.

 

_________________________

 

The swaying meadow grass crunched under our horse's hooves a week later. The afternoon peaceful, serene into quaint. The snow-capped Alps too far away for worry yet, and whenever Kylo's gloved hand squeezed my hip the rest of our party had traveled too far ahead of us to hear my startled noise.

 

“Shh,” Kylo loosened his hold, “do not scare them.”

 

“Who?”

 

"By that farthest bush, there hides a den of foxes,” Kylo said, pointing towards blackberry brambles with his free hand. “A litter of little ones squirming around their mother, begging for a drink with funny yips. Alas,” he sighed, “to your ever-present horror, I supposedly do not regret much, but believe me when I say that I think it a shame that your human ears can not hear the babes."

 

"I wouldst not give up my humanity to hear crying," I quipped.

 

Instead of taking offense, Kylo chuckled. The amusement over what I'd said vibrating from his chest into my back. "You know,” he drawled, squeezing my hip again. “My men art human and they hath plenty enough heard  _you_ whimpering and crying out my name in your sleep. All those pretty pleadings that I wager they wouldst not one bit mind hearing from an even farther distance when you soak your thighs with sweet like that, practically shimmer with it, and I can not wait."

 

"For what?" I croaked, scandalized into breathless by his vulgarities. Those vile words warranting a slap across his face even as my teeth unconsciously scraped over my lip once the notion hit to lean into his touch, feel his fingers dip lower on my body. "To eat me in my sleep?"

 

"Ne," Kylo deeply inhaled, holding the breath as though he savored my arousal, my shameful quickening heartbeats, "to feast on all that wet when you’re awake until your hard words become soft moans."

 

The things he said. The way he said it. Oh, I could practically hear my decency begging my pelvis not to rock towards the saddle horn in response, avoid pressing a second of relief against my suddenly sensitive sex that demanded something from me- everything from him.

 

But the wanton in me won out.

 

I inched forward.

 

My shudder, his prize.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do so hope that you enjoyed Rey's journey from horrified to hot and bothered!
> 
> As for some full on monster fucking, the next chapter is full of it! It's just....filthy, but I'd love to know what you thought about this chapter/their chemistry so far. Please feel free to drop a comment, or kudo, or yell at me on Tumblr where you can see this wonderful gifset from Josskuhh
> 
> https://ohthatbunnygirl.tumblr.com/post/179970795837/josskuhh-if-we-go-down-in-flames-the-smoke-is
> 
> -Bunny


	4. Chapter 4

A talk planted seeds in me.

 

A growing, lush, need to know more.

 

A flourishing desire to face my demons and demented desires, and even when the saner half of my head pushed me to reject buying into Prince Kylo's insinuations, I ended up nurturing each curious impulse whipping a frenzy inside of me. I allowed the urges to breed and multiply. I fed them on a steady diet of attention, and after a fourth restless night of sleep, I set them free into the world by turning in my saddle on a road to who knows where.

 

“Why me?”   

 

My husband’s head slightly tilted in confusion.

 

“Pardon?”

 

“Why court uncertainty?” I clarified, my back aching from continuously leaning forward, my body held away from Kylo’s firm chest since my traitorous spine longed to venture closer, to mold the both of us into one.“If Raška maidens wouldst happily join with you, why pursue a prospect less inclined to accept the offer?”

 

In the space of the weighty silence that followed, I discovered that I could not hazard a guess if the prince leaned towards responding with a truthful answer or a lewd remark.

 

Oh, to be sure, my husband undoubtedly appreciated my countenance. He frequently, indecently complimented me. He made of meal of feasting on my blushes, but fine features alone did not seem like enough balance to counter the struggles between us. How could turning the apples of my cheeks into a tawny russet ever be worth the bitter aftertaste of me continuing to reject him afterward?

 

  _What different angle am I missing?_

_Why provoke me with a cunning tongue that he threatens to use?_

_Why pretend that I am someone he desires on his level when only the treetops can serve as viable companions?_

 

The longer that he waited to answer my inquiries, the more I decided that the mule of a man would not. However, yet again, Prince Kylo made a mockery of my expectations. For only a few seconds longer, he wore the most inscrutable expression before decisively flicking his wrist. His steed brought to an abrupt halt. The horse soon dropping his head to graze on dandelions, and my husband smoothly dismounting before making a beckoning gesture for me to follow. The most tempting breadcrumbs laid at my feet if only I would gather the bravery to pursue the uncertain path to answers- go obediently along with him. The security of the safe road behind me abandoned to venture forward with the man who'd stolen my innocence, but to my shock, I required clarity more than caution.

 

Oh yes, I matched my husband's pace.

 

In not my wisest moment, I turned my back on daylight for the refuge of shadows underneath snow dusted spruce trees. The moodiest location possible pulling us closer to its bosom step by step, the very home of where secrets likely lived and wicked pacts were made surrounding us. All the reason a sensible person needed to turn around and bolt towards the familiar road behind, but my runaway pulse calmed the longer that I stared at the prince’s broad back. His hands casually gathering his dark hair into a low knot, a length of leather securing all those inky black tresses. A slim chance of any curls falling into his eyes when he spoke up again, and speak up he did whenever we finally reached a circle of towering ivory birches that acted as silent witnesses for our confessions.

 

“Twas a year ago I first heard of you.” Kylo rested his back against a tree, his mouth slanting towards mocking. ”The fairest princess with a most inviting dowry and a need for a husband. But, I had no need for an English rose.”

 

“Then why pick one?”

 

At my wordplay, Kylo broke out a slow-growing smile.

 

The most unexpected, sincere levity sparking between us. A last chance for relaxing into near normalcy before the scales tipped us back to unsettled, his lips pressing into resigned seriousness. “In short order, you turned down the Duke of Orange,” he rattled off, raising a finger for each name, “that foolish Earl of Ormond, the Prince of Paliano, the Count of Nassau-Idstein, the Count of Montpensier, a count from Glatz, a viceroy of something or other, another three Bohemian royals and over thirty similar men of substance who art unrelated but all share the unique claim of falling at your feet and failing to sway you.”

 

_Ah, there we go._

 

In hindsight, I ought to have made more of an effort to tuck my disappointment down and off of my features. My hurt not so easily read by the one who harmed me. A forced nonchalance continuing to rest on my face since from the tender age of five the expectations for my future royal role were always plainly laid out for me.  

 

Like my peers and parents, I would not marry for love.

 

Nae, as a princess, I was destined to marry for convenience- my parent’s convenience. The most useful part of my personage residing between my thighs- never between my ears- and if I ever forgot the way of the world, my parents frequently reminded me. At one memorable dinner- when mother imbibed in two cups past too much currant cordial- she went so far as to snicker between slurps that if I were lucky my newly beloved might bed and breed me early in the marriage.

 

“A child swiftly pushed out of you before someone more common shall carry on regularly shouldering the satisfying of your husband’s persistent pillock.”

 

My mother adding an eyebrow raise to punctuate the implied delights of nights free of amorous pestering, and my spine curved. A solid half of me visibly wilting at the table after hearing about the best case scenario for my marital match. Is it any wonder that I dallied for as long as possible before making a decision? Is it so extraordinary that I took my time choosing prospects who might end up as a friendly "enough" husband?

 

In the face of a grim, loveless future, I resolved to act prudently, but Kylo so clearly considered my cautiousness as nothing more than an amusing competition worth winning once it became impossible for others.

 

_Ah, these kings and their thirst for thrusting their flags in fertile soil._

 

I looked towards the sky, a bottoming out of my stomach in tandem with it after realizing that I foolishly expected more from him. In spite of his position as a man in power, I had imagined some hidden romantic thread woven into our marriage tapestry, and there went a pang of betrayal tugging at my very fibers after he unraveled the fantasy. There went my hands shaking by my thighs.

 

"I see.” I pressed my fingers to my lips to keep them from trembling too, my voice as embarrassingly brittle as I had ever heard it as my lungs likely caved in to offer a supportive cocoon for my wounded heart. “So you sought me out to best all your peers who failed before you."

 

"Ne, draga,” Kylo sighed, annoyance flaring his nostrils. “I cared not a whit about any others seeking your hand."

 

"Come now!" I dropped my hand, raised my voice. "How can you pretend you art an indifferent creature at your core? You forget that I hath watched you circle your prey. You, who art entertained by looming larger than life over other men including my father."

 

"I shan't apologize for seeing cruel, foolish men for what they art- a possible food source."

 

"See-" 

 

"However," he nipped my rant in the bud with a razor sharp word before painstakingly tampering his tone back to civil, "I swear on my wings that I never considered marriage with you as a means to compete with others. Aye, I freely admit to your feisty glare that I did not see your charms when I first heard of you, but quite soon I truly desired to meet the princess capable of steering a cunning king away from his best interests.”

 

“Oh, how you adore slandering him and me,” I seethed. “Hath you no decency at all?”

 

“None for him, ‘tis not in my nature to drum up respect for a man who considered his fondness for you his weakest quality.”

 

“You know nothing of my father,” I scoffed, dismissing his ignorance with an eye roll. “You art aiming to wound with a lousy throw.”

 

The lowest grunt slipped free from Prince Kylo, and he placed one hand behind him. His body propelled forward and off the tree with a light push. His movements graceful, fluid. A regal nonchalance present in every gesture that could be considered the height of royal style in some countries, but I knew better. Oh, I had seen the otherness in him. I recognized the unnatural breaking through the facade again, and without a moment's hesitation, I backed away from the top of the food chain.

 

I swore he flinched.

 

A crinkle present at the corners of his sun tea-colored eyes. A droop of his shoulders, but before I could certify that I had managed to upset a monster in luxurious leather, Kylo lifted his chest again. The slight show of vulnerability gone. A pillar of confidence restored.

 

“What I know,” he crisply replied, keeping his distance,“‘tis that at least three neighboring country suitors should hath received an immediate aye from a king who stood to gain from them significant property, alliances, coin, and an impressive title for his only daughter. As we art speaking freely now, if your father possessed a shred of control concerning the matter, I should never hath had the opportunity to meet you. The two of us in the same room defies reason, and that can only signify that the King's little poppet truly pulled the strings on betrothal decisions.”

 

“What art you insinuating?”

 

“That his affection for you colored his decision making.”

 

"I suppose a savage like  _you_  wouldst find it unreasonable that a powerful king valued my opinion,” I retorted, proudly grinning, “but 'tis no failing of my father that he was man enough to favor my good opinion. A princess’s happiness should matter.”

 

“Aye draga,” Kylo agreed, pity softening his tone, “and how he grudged you for that control over him. Why else fail to warn you about my added attributes?”

 

I blinked twice in shock.

 

“You, y-you suggest our marriage was some sort of punishment?”

 

The smallest nod tipped Kylo’s chin, and I glanced from forest floor to sky to anywhere but him.

 

“Nae, y-you forced his hand...he could not refuse a nightmare.”

 

At the sound of my distress, Kylo closed the distance between us.

 

“Why reject the truth, and me, but never him who treated you so unkindly? Look at who you art here with, princess.” Kylo gently guided my chin up with his hand, forcing me to face all the ugliness that he laid out in front of me. “Your father possessed two whole months after reading my letter of intent to meet you- all the time in the world to push you into marrying someone else. But he did not, did he? Ne, he encouraged you to hope for something you could never have, the choice to marry me never fully yours if you went in blindly-"

 

"I beseech you. Please, stop-"

 

"You art holding on," Kylo exclaimed, releasing my chin when my tears landed on his glove. Flicking the signs of my weakness away, and then pointing vexation right back at me. ”You worship a traitorous maggot who traded you for firepower and for the added benefit of no longer simply making do with imagining ripping you to shreds when he was certain that I wouldst someday carry out the deed for him in a fit of anger."

 

"Nae, he loves me-"

 

"And look what he did because of it," Kylo growled, a righteous fire curling his lip. "Let your past affection die, little one. Kill it, and with unbiased eyes, you shall see why I openly disrespected him. Why I loathe him for you yesterday and always."

 

“But m-mother warned me about you,” I insisted, crying harder. “She cared, she tried to dissuade me-”

 

“Oh, and how hard she tried if you art here alone with me.”

 

I resisted. After years of training for the role of faithful daughter, I valiantly resisted his wooing by common sense. My head shaking to negate Kylo’s impact inside. My little loyal lip jutting out, but Kylo's hand lifted from pointing at my sternum to stroke my teary cheek. All the disturbing truths that I had avoided for weeks seemingly set into my pores with the gentlest touch back and forth. His intentions to sooth my warring heart and head breaking down something different inside of me, and after another unladylike sniffle, I surrendered. I let myself listen and think.

 

The fight snuffed out of me with a whimper.

 

The time for disagreeing with my husband coming to a devastating end after I made the fatal mistake of keeping still long enough to hold his brutally honest gaze. The excuses for others instantly feeling hollow in my belly when the thinnest lava ring circled Prince Ren’s pupils, that most unnatural quirk alone serving as proof enough that I was treated poorly by those who claimed to love me best.

 

_If I recognize something inhuman in him, surely father and mother heard of it first._

 

My head turned into his hand. A steady breath against his palm harder to come. My vision tunneling into a pinprick and why not when underneath my husband's polished prince veneer lay something menacing enough to earn him the opportunity to talk down to my parents in their realm. The fear of upsetting him potent enough to seal their mouths shut, keep them subdued. Their objections limited to the briefest looks towards their laps since they already heard Queen Leia's name quite enough over suppers with foes and friends- a shiver tightening the voices by those discussing her victories- and yet father did not once warn me away from the marriage to a son who perchance shared her same fiery temperament.

 

Nae, quite the opposite, my father willingly threw me to the wolf at the door.

 

This from a man who frequently cooed at me about the necessity of meticulously keeping up with royal gossip. He who guided a quill into my hand for the first time when I was three. The most persuasive voice reminding his small child that all overheard whispered hallway arguments should find their way to ink and page in case those secrets might one-day help pit future enemies against those closest to them, and I shuddered at the memories of a king who made plans to turn love against you.

 

_He knew._

_He knew who he gave you to._

_He knew you would end up at the mercy of someone whispered to be unmerciful._

 

"There it is," Kylo murmured, lowering his head to nuzzle his cheek against mine as if scenting the anger coursing through my veins, longing to lick it off. "Ah, you see."

 

A practical princess should have run away from a beast coming too close. The devil you know not good enough for me when vicious talons could suddenly extend from his fingertips to part ribs from meat. But fury buzzed in my ears, and I hunkered down in the heart of the hornet's nest. No reasons left in my mind to fear anything if I could make a creature as ruthless as Prince Kylo Ren purr.

 

"I did so treasure torturing your parents for letting me take you." Kylo pressed a kiss to my jaw, another between each promise. "And as your husband, I shall burn them on the spot if ever you desire it. My wedding gift for you, my draga.”

 

How strange that it took eighteen years for my parents to mold me into an adult and less than two months with my husband to destroy everything I thought I had known. The lines between myth and reality scattered into the wind. My faith in the goodwill of my family obliterated.

 

A daughter before, but an orphan in his arms.

________________________________

 

 

On the road to camp, I shed frustrated, accepting, angry tears.

 

The hardest fought emotional journey working me over from a forest full of melancholia into a firefly-lit thicket that I could not appreciate, and to his credit, Kylo tolerated my mourning until the sun hung low in the gloomy sky. The night arriving to black out the worst spots in my day. Kylo’s equally dark gloved hand reaching forward to rest upon my hip, my very own royal touchstone urging me to raise my head as high as one befitting my station, and I straightened in the saddle. In silent agreement with him that I had suffered enough, did not care to bend for my family any longer.

 

“You questioned why I choose you” Kylo spoke low, my ears alone his intended audience. “But who could resist a princess who clings to her opinions in the face of opposition? A lady who knows her own mind, the most subtle fighter without need of a blade to best a king.”

 

A wash of crimson painted my cheeks.

 

The compliments leaving a mark among my many freckles.

__________________________________   

 

 

At night, I rested on my side.

 

Undoubtedly, a vision of comfort in the wild when curled up on top of a straw bed fashioned for my slumber by my husband, but my fingers remained restless. The tips of my touches drifting from my arm to my hair to back onto the ground. A longing for more comforting closeness keeping sleep at bay, and my wide-awake eyes followed bonfire sparks climbing fire dipped ladders to the stars.

 

A pop of orange. A pop of yellow.

 

A pair of amber eyes on me.

 

“Enjoying the view?” I shot my whisper towards the eagle perched in the tree above, unwilling to extend any further energy on my end when my shadow heard me well enough. “Doth something burning bring you sweet dreams?”

 

The intimidating predator cocked his head.

 

The mocking, dispassionate gesture instantly recognizable as belonging to my husband, but his wings extended with feeling after the wind sent a stray ember to my bedding. A burst of heat beside my pinkie. A jolt to my system, but nothing compared to the second startle brought on by my husband dropping into a crouch beside me. As human as I- and unclothed as can be- when he commenced inspecting my skin with cautious caresses. His eyebrows drawn together into a severe v when examining me for burns, his lightest touches hammering in that my well-being mattered to him, and I shivered at each tactile connection. My bones, without question, trying their best to leap out and cage him in with me, force him to continue sheltering me from all the hurts and chill and loneliness.  

 

“Ne razumen,” Kylo murmured, turning my hand over in his, “how you shake but I scent no injury.”

 

“Aye,” I swallowed hard, my stare following the firelight illuminating the muscular planes across his chest, his taut stomach, his thighs. “Tis only you who scorches under my skin now.”

 

As if I broke the spell restricting him to his best behavior, most openly sensitive, the attention to my hand ceased. The ensuing quiet betwixt us almost unbearable. A rush of embarrassment instantly wiping away all my further candor, but I stopped worrying myself sick over what I'd said after Kylo raised his hooded gaze.

 

“How thoughtless of me, shall I help shed your garments so the evening chill might cool you off?”

 

“My liege!”

 

A rakish grin tilted Kylo's lips, and to escape the fresh heat flaming up my skin, I shifted attention towards the men beyond the bonfire.

 

“How crude you art to voice indelicate questions when others may hear,” I whispered.

 

 “Wouldst you rather I retire for the night and let politeness stay on as your bedfellow?”

 

“Nae,” I sharply replied, too insistent. Too shamefully desperate for his skin on mine again, and when the most striking man I had ever laid eyes on looked close to laughing at my outburst, I placed three fingers against his throat. The bloody drumbeat felt upon my fingers as primal and demanding as the one ramping up in my chest. My confidence soaring after receiving confirmation that I ruled over his senses as well as he ruled over mine, and my teeth skimmed over my bottom lip. “Nae, I possess not the emotional wherewithal to continue paying for the price it takes to keep you at bay when I desire you closer.”

 

The hard exhalation from Kylo turned white in the frigid air, and he stared at my mouth.

 

My eyes.

 

My mouth again.

 

“You invite me to bed you?”

 

“Tis no currency worth more than your touch,” I softly admitted, delicately courageous to the point of subtlety parting my knees in invitation. “Please husband, be generous.”

 

As I waited like a wanton wench, my pride on the line, Kylo moved not a muscle to claim his prize. For all those many sordid speeches during our travels that mentioned ravishing me rabid, his hands remained loose at his side. The hesitation on his end keenly felt by me. The rejection lowering my previously perky stare, and I feared a change of heart after my brazen demands. The worst of my doubts winning over before Kylo surged forward. His lips capturing my gasp, his fingers rucking up my underdress until he'd freed my first moan of many with skillful out of control. The broken, needy sounds that we stole from one another touch by maddening touch growing in urgency on top of the bed he made for me as we made a mess of each other, and I was soaring while flat on my back.

 

How naive.

 

How foolishly I’ve lived.

 

How utterly blind to the ways of the world I felt I had been if I didn’t understand before that a broken breath against my neck could bow my back in ecstasy. My body under the command of another without any shouts, already standing at attention while limp beneath him and I fell in line to following anywhere he'd lead me if only he'd continue whispering my name while straddling my waist. His awed opinions repeated between quickening kisses that traveled from my neck to my clavicles and to my breast that Kylo cupped in his hand after baring it. A delicate, exploratory touch expected, but a rough squeeze lifted my nipple, and I forgot myself.  

 

“Please,” I whimpered, arching into his touch. “Oh please-”

 

"What doth you beg for?"

 

"You-"

 

“Louder, little wife,“ Kylo skimmed a nail over my sensitive skin, summoned goosebumps to the surface of my belly before another cruel and lovely pull.” Let those men you worried about hear who satisfies you tonight- who is it who means to devour the sweet nectar you’ve gathered betwixt your thighs for me.”

 

“Kylo, please-”

 

At the rise of his name to reach the stars, he dipped his head. The peak of my abused nipple surrounded by his hot, wet mouth. His hand inching to my cunny. A soft suck above at the same time as a hard press below, and when his fingers circled round and round until inside me, I followed orders.

 

I screamed.

 

The skies. The slumbering animals. The men with ears for miles and miles were made witness to my demanding a drifting-to-between-my-legs Kylo to keep touching right there, keep rubbing right there, sucking my swollen flesh between laps of his tongue until I spasm around him. A surge of reckless euphoria battering against his knuckles, and he was the one left soaked by my froth.

 

A slick of me all milky on his lips, but before I summoned shame, he’d crawled over my body in motion too swift for my eyes to keep up. My wrists gathered in one of his hands, pinned over my head. I, his prisoner. I, his eager slave held captivated beyond reason. All that I could sense becoming him and his naked body above me with the tart scent of my pleasure on his thumb wedging between my lips. A salty slip across my tastebuds. A taste of the obscene that brings fascination to his eyes when I licked off myself before he’s greedily kissing me clean and dirty and wonderful again.

 

The essence of me retrieved.

 

The more I gave, the more he craved.

 

I laughed. In spite of the seriousness of the occasion, I laughed again. A clear as a bell expression of awe as my pleasure still rung in my ears, and why not celebrate? For ages and ages, I agonized over joining with my husband. I was warned of the pain and shame, but never the rewards. This bone-deep satisfaction when we mortals touch the unexplainable sublime, and what else do you call drawing out a groan from a man who towered over me? The exchange of power and passion with the devil himself making me impatiently writhe for more opportunities to drag noises from him, to match his dependency on me. The yearning to hold onto him forever moving beyond intoxicating into necessary for all my days, and still I come out on top even whence I am beneath him, but perhaps he knew it.

 

_Why else pull away with a frown?_

 

“You art so soon sated?” I asked, my heart jumping with concern. “Hath I displeased you, my liege?

 

A muscle in his jaw jumped.

 

“Ne.”

 

“You long for me still?”

 

“I do.”

 

In the wake of banishing my comparison of what normal and right looked like in my life, I could admit that I wanted nothing of my past but everything with him.

 

He who told the truth.

 

He who forced me to look at the world differently.

 

From even that first time when I endeavored to lay judgment upon him, this hot and cold creature pulled at something wrong and foreign inside of me.

 

And God above, I wanted him to find it- to free it.

 

“Then why so selfish with your needs?" I looked up, pressed forward for both our sake. "Why deny yourself when I feel it resting full and heavy upon my leg?” 

 

“Because I shall hurt you now,” Kylo, at last, admitted, the warning raspy in his throat even though his hand hitched my thigh up around his waist. ”There is nothing left to do but hurt you,” he took his cock in his palm, shuddered at the intimate feeling of skin on skin that fluttered my lashes when he slid forward along me, “and for once, I mourn the spilling of blood, but be comforted that afterward none shall ever dare hurt you again.“

 

I nodded my head in understanding.

 

As if I could possibly forget just what I planned to sacrifice myself to, Kylo reminded me with an inhuman ripple of bones underneath his skin from shoulder to shoulder. A prod from pushed down wings longing to rip free. A last attempt to scare me into sensible, but I bucked my hips up. A veritable virginal feast inviting him to sample my goods, the first inch took by me, and an encouraged Kylo sheathed into my body in one stroke.

 

A whisper of my name, a rip of my maidenhead, and I am his.

 

“Look at you.” Kylo’s lip curled, the tendons in his arms straining as he shallowed his thrusts for my sake. “Savršen.”

 

I gasped. “What say you?”

 

“Perfect.” he bowed his head, kissed me deeply. “You art perfect.”

 

He kissed the insides of my wrists, my palm, down my throat. All the points in my body where my wildly pulsing heartbeat met skin, and it was if he smelled the blood beneath and was thanking my veins for trusting him to be this close.

 

In the midst of my feverish vulnerability, I needed his gravelly praise as badly as I needed our chests pressed together. Our rise and fall in sync, indescribable. Those encouraging words from that pink, gorgeous mouth of his trickling adored warmth down my chest and into my fingers that gripped his shoulders in return, pulled him closer. His cock bottoming out in me, my toes curled as I stretch from ruined to wanting. The steady in and out as painful as he promised at first, as capable of dampening my cheeks, but I couldn't tear my watery stare away from where our bodies met for an exchange of fluids and fears and phenomenal. The slippery spread of me all over him. The sharp sensations gradually pitching from unbearable into unbelievable after he dropped his thumb to praise between my thighs, and quicker and quicker I was flying.

 

Surely I was weightless.

 

The world that I reckoned I knew before suspended leagues and leagues beneath us with nothing to cushion me from the comedown, but with an arch of my back, I constricted around him. My body holding him deep for dear life- for more. For a lifetime of this and him and us, but how brightly the light shined behind my shut eyes. The sparks he inspired in me heating my skin throughout my leg quaking, abs rippling. The most glorious, passionate pleasure rolling on and on and on so that I barely noticed Kylo locking his arms around my back, turning me until my cheek pressed into the ground. The last of his driving thrusts ramming hard and carnal as though we were little more than animals rutting into the field and judging by how much pleasure I derived from him drenching my insides with his seed, we just might be.

 

Aye, surely we art animals.

 

__________________________________

 

At the end of the night, when strength refused to summon again into our well-used limbs, we chased slumber under furs and a few lazy last kisses on the back of my neck.

 

The arms of my husband securely wrapped around me when my eyes closed.

 

He at my back as he always preferred.

 

The plentiful expected questions and self-reflective doubts saved for later- hopefully never if I aimed to remain so happily satiated and sensually soiled- and neither of us stirred before dawn broke a morning anew. Oh, I could not be bothered by cheery bird songs forcing the campsite into lazily rustling about, the sun peeking out to lick my skin with warmth, and perhaps that was because I was saving my shocked wake up for the searing heat pounding a hello against my spine. A rhythmic scorching over and over again that I could not place before I turned and noticed steamy exhalations from a full grown Zmaj surrounding me. His snout beside my shoulder. His leathery wings serving as my blanket, and my fingers dug into the bedding. The first threads of panic sewing into my system when I appeared primed to become another unwilling Medieval flayed martyr.

 

“Husband,” I begged,” awake, you singe me.”

 

I could have sworn he chuckled, and I impulsively elbowed him for it.

 

The first point in our skirmish awarded to me, but the hellish creature who had continued evenly breathing won all the following battles with an unintentional flick of his barbed tail. A blur of black and purple cutting into the sky. The exact opposite of an apology flowing from him when sharp scales nick my arm. My blood spilled by my husband for the second time in twenty-four hours, and I growled a warning before foolishly climbing on top of a Zmaj four times my size.

 

My nails desperate to find something unguarded enough on him to wound him back and my victorious grasp on his cock snapped his reptilian eyes open.

 

A warning chuff.

 

The narrowing of his pupils into foreboding crescents that I entirely ignored as I instinctively squeezed the only part of his armored body where the creature remained soft, but instead of howling in aggravated pain, my massive Kylo rolled onto his back. A nod of his head to continue. The point made abundantly clear that my harming made him hum for more, but once the onyx to purple to pink flesh in my hand grew to the length of my arm, I forgot why I woke up so aggravated.

 

Oh goodness, I plum forgot everything beyond desire to lick off all the salty, rare pearls spilling down my hand after I pumped up hard and fast on him. The morning started with the last of my morals discarded by way of tongue flicks after getting down on my knees for him.

 

I, the former maiden with a taste for a monster.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh heeey,
> 
> Thanketh thee for reading my old-timey shapeshifter smut. 
> 
> I thought it would be kind to give Rey some traditional smut first- because I am clearly a very traditional gal- but it gets real wild next chapter. Love to know what you thought of the forest confessions and angst and reptilian blowjobs!
> 
> -Bunny


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